Awards and Recognitions

Monday, August 6, 2007

Ok, I admit it. I've finished THE HIDDEN WORLDS. It lived up to its promise of a fast read. However, I will continue to post on it in parts as I ruminate over the plot.

Linnea has discovered a family secret that affects the family of Pilot-Masters on Nexus, the hub of the Hidden Worlds. With the help of a govenrment bureaucrat, she finds the means to leave her world and go to Nexus as an indentured servant, where she intends to offer the secret in return for certain help from them. However, she has no idea that the family secret is the reason behind her world's desperate condition, and when she arrives at Nexus, she steps into a huge spider web of deceit, backstabbing and just pain evil.

While she travels to Nexus, we get to meet Iain, one of the Pilot-Masters, and we get to learn a bit about his mysterious world. Here is where I have a quibble with the plot. It doesn't seem like the Pilot-Masters reproduce often enough to sustain their population. I won't go into all the details because I don't want to give away too much plot. However, I can say that population is strictly controlled (or so they think) and it's a major honor for a man to be selected to father a child. We're talking ceremonies and orgy-like parties, here. Since not every son can become a Pilot-Master, one would think that all Pilot-Masters would be encouraged to have many sons.

However, I found the story absorbing enough to set aside my doubts. Linnea arrives onto Nexus to find that her master had no idea that she was to be his servant. He suspects that his father knows something of it, however his father orders him to turn Linnea over to him and pursue the matter no further.

The society on Nexus reminds me a great deal of ancient Rome, especially the father-son relationship. In Rome, the father's word had the force of law. It seems much the same on Nexus. Therefore, it's a shocking thing when Iain disobeys his father and goes to his treacherous cousin for the truth -- thus unleashing the momentum for the rest of the book.

My impression was that attempts to suppress mankind's natural need to reproduce are always bound to fail. And indeed . . . but I don't want to give too much away. I hope you get a chance to read the rest of it.